Crust Pizzeriza Napoletana – Vienna, VA

I came here on another recommendation from my Italian co-worker. She recommended I try the Pizza Fritta, which turns out to be a Fried Calzone, so that’s exactly what I did. I went a few hours after lunchtime, so the place was pretty dead. The atmosphere of the venue was open and modern with a little Italian flair adorning the walls here and there. I could see a wood-fire oven in the corner behind the cash register. Once I ordered, I sat down and waited for about ten minutes for the calzone to arrive and, when it did, I have to say that I had never seen a calzone like this one. It was clearly fried, as the dough resembled a funnel cake of some kind. It wasn’t topped with anything, but sprinkled green with chopped basil or parsley. Yes, this calzone was “doughy” but being fried dough was quite flavorful by itself. The calzone contained ricotta cheese, a thin authentic-style Italian sauce, and thick sliced and diced cuts of what appeared to be ham but the website calls it “Salami di Napoli”. The ham/salami was cured and gave a salty flavor to the dish. The interesting thing about the frying process was that it created a “stew” out of the inside of the calzone so that all of the individual ingredients were mixed together into a soupy pinkish mess inside the pocket. There were also what appeared to be whole bay leaves cooked inside with the other ingredients, and their flavor permeated everything about the calzone. Despite the unappealing look of the inside, this calzone was quite good. I would say that this calzone was medium-big, it wasn’t as big as the biggest I’ve had so far, but it certainly was larger than average. It was not served with any marinara sauce. I give this calzone a B- because the bay leaves were very powerful, it was just slightly too much dough, and the cost of this meal was $15. I would have maybe charged $10 or $11 for it and still thought that was generous.

Ledo's Pizza - Springfield, VA (Round 2)

So I've been to Ledo's maybe 5 or 6 times now. Each time was pretty consistent, and that's what one would expect from a local chain restaurant.

BUT NOT THIS TIME. This time, it was different.

It had been about 8 or 9 months since I had been to Ledo's, maybe even longer. I'm not sure what they've done, but their Chicken Calzone has changed and for the BETTER!.

First of all, it's packed with a lot more stuffing. The bread comes in that classic crispy crust, and they've turned it up to 11. There is grilled chicken slices, sauteed mushrooms, garlic, and onions. The Ledo's sauce is tangy and mildly spicy and works wonderfully. The calzone claims to have about 1600 calories, and it only costs $7.99!

Furthermore, I was helped by no less than 4 people, each one of them asking me if I needed something or if someone else had already gotten my order. The food was much faster as well, only took about 15 minutes to receive the meal.

Ledo's classic square calzone may not be anything close to an authentic italian calzone, but it sure is good. I'm re-rating this calzone at an A- for being the same thing it was before, only better!

Sodexo Cafeteria inside the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office – Alexandria, VA

I did not plan to eat here. It was by accident that, while I was at a naturalization ceremony, I forgot my sandwich in the car. When I arrived at the cafeteria, there was one sausage and cheese calzone left. I’ll be frank here, the calzone was not as bad as some of the other ones on this list. It was a pretty decent size; I would say a solid “medium”. The price of it ended up being $5.89, which, if you’ve read my other reviews now makes it the cheapest calzone I have eaten. I was however charged a “meal tax” of 0.31 cents, whatever that is. The calzone contained marinara sauce, which was pretty regular; ricotta cheese, which was nice; mozzarella cheese, also normal; and, finally, chunks of Italian sausage. The sausage here reminded me of eating at Mangino’s, in that it was just actual “hot dog style” sausage which was cut into pieces. Unlike Mangino’s though, it was much easier to eat. The sausage was pretty good, and wasn’t spicy at all. I give this calzone a D+ because I would much rather eat some other calzone, but it wasn’t bad for the price and as a replacement for a forgotten lunch.

The Esposito’s – Fairfax, VA

I am not fully sure how to describe this calzone. It was some kind of crazy hybrid between a pizza and a calzone. Not much was actually in the “pocket”. The mozzarella was on top, the bread was about as thick as pizza dough, inside was ricotta cheese and Italian sausage. The overall size of the calzone was bigger than average, and this was the small one they offered. The one thing that The Esposito’s succeeded in, that a couple of other calzone places I’ve listed failed at, was to accurately put an amount of sausage into the calzone to give it flavor but not overpower it with a “salt” sensation. I have to say, this calzone was REALLY good. One of the better ones that I’ve had so far in Northern Virginia. I would say that the $11.99 price tag was pretty fair considering the decent amount of ricotta, the superb ratio of sausage, the flawless execution of bakery skill and the size of the dish. I also happened to order the calamari appetizer. I have to say that this was one of the most well prepared calamari dishes I’ve ever had as well. The marinara it was served with was spot-on, the lemons, and the amount of breading couple with the delicate frying technique all played together to create a most satisfying dish. The atmosphere of the restaurant was also probably the best I’ve found. It would seem that all or most of the staff in the restaurant are actual Italians. When I sat down, I was given water immediately, the waitress listed the specials, and then plates were cleared. Classic. I would call this restaurant high-end Italian comfort food. There didn’t appear to be any “fusion” or “flair” to the meals, they were just classic Italian dishes just like you know and love, but likely with a much higher quality than you or I could prepare them. The decorum of the venue gives off an old-world charm. You won’t find any plastic knives or paper napkins here (well maybe underneath the calamari to catch the grease). With my entire meal (appetizer Calzone, soft drink) the bill ended up being $24.10. I dropped $30 and left completely satisfied. I probably wouldn’t visit this restaurant every weekend. In fact, it’s so nice that I’m more likely to return, if and when I am ever able to score a date with a female, as a classic “nice dinner” move. This calzone gets a B+ because it was perfectly baked, strangely designed, and the ricotta cheese was ever-so-slightly cool.

Pomodoro – Fairfax, VA

I first tried to go here before I went to Tony’s NY Pizza, but it happened to be closed for renovations on the day I chose. So, this time, I called ahead of time and was informed that they were open. I made the 10 mile trip from my house and found the restaurant to be a kind of “cafeteria” style place, one where you order your food in a line and they call your number to come pick it up. The cashier, who I assumed to be the owner/manager, was very nice and fronted me 7 cents instead of breaking a dollar into 92 cents for my change. I wanted to tip him or the establishment, but there was no tip jar. There were also no servers, so I wasn’t sure about leaving a tip on the table. I ordered the Ham Calzone this time around. It didn’t take too long to arrive, perhaps 5-10 minutes. When I got it, I realized that it was on the smaller sizes of the calzones that I have eaten so far; pretty comparable to the size I was served at Tony’s. I would call this one a “small” calzone in comparison to the ones I’ve already eaten. As soon as I started eating it, I realized that the dough used was super-tough. It was a very thick style of bread, made with a decent amount of butter/oil and sugar. I could smell the sweetness of it. It reminded me a lot of that thick European bread that you can get for 50 cents a loaf hot and fresh on the street in Ukraine. That sounds all well and good, but it was very tough, and puffy. Since the Calzone was kind of small, the puffy bread took up quite the percentage of the meal. In fact, I would say the bread was about 50-60% of the entire entrée. Did I mention that it was tough to cut through and chew? It was. Pomodoro did not skimp on the ricotta cheese though. They put in the healthiest helping of it that they could. As you pulled the Calzone apart, you could tell that it was mixed with the mozzarella cheese pretty well. One huge detractor from this Calzone was the ham. I know in previous postings that I have complained about the ham being too salty and overpowering the dish, but this ham was very nearly uncured and had almost no flavor whatsoever. There was no salt to mix with the sweetness of the ricotta and that was just kind of sad. I don’t think it would have made any difference on the dish whatsoever if the ham was simply left out. The dish was served with a nice portion of a pretty good marinara sauce; one that wasn’t spicy but didn’t taste particularly fake or canned either. Maybe it was, but I liked it all the same. The price of this calzone was $7.25, so it wasn’t particularly expensive. An interesting thing I noticed was that the appetizer of calamari costs more, at $9.50, than this main dish. The issues with this Calzone come from some of the standard potholes that I think boutique pizza parlors probably fall into. In general, their specialty is their pizza, and calzones are an afterthought. They often use the same dough, and same ingredients that they would on their pizzas. In fact, I know their pizzas would be tasty based on what kind of dough they use, but I just don’t think it worked well here in this format. I give this Calzone an D- because it was on the small side, too bready, and there was no ham flavor at all. The only bonus comes from the fact that I think the employees are great and the atmosphere of the restaurant is better than most.

Tony’s NY Pizza – Chantilly, VA

So this place wasn’t my first choice. I tried to go to Pomodoro in Fairfax, VA first but, when I arrived, they were closed for renovations or something. I quickly searched Google Maps and found this place less than two miles away. The first thing that you’ll notice upon stepping into the restaurant is that it smells like an old-folks home; like cleaner and urine. It was very strange. There were a decent amount of patrons at 2:00pm in the afternoon, and the pizza was behind glass. Most of what was on offer looked pretty appetizing. I ordered the “meat calzone” which supposedly comes with four types of cheese, pepperoni, and sausage. It took the restaurant about 15 minutes to cook it. It was, what I would describe as, a “small” calzone. Probably the smallest I’ve had so far. As an interesting thing to note though, I think this is probably the size a calzone “should” be, or traditionally is. I think that I’ve become biased to calzone sizes by eating so many of them over the history of this venture. The calzone was half-moon pocketbook shaped (standard) and it was served with a little cup of marinara sauce. When I cut open the calzone, I noticed that this was another situation where the restaurant used the same toppings they would have put on a pizza. We had pepperoni slices and Italian sausage sliced short-ways. There was plenty of grease from the meat that was contained in the pocket. I also only counted two kinds of cheese, mozzarella and ricotta. Holy crap though! A restaurant that remembered to put ricotta cheese in though! This is becoming a rarity! I thought the calzone was alright… pretty decent as a matter of fact… yet, still, I would describe it like carnival food, as I have so many times before. It didn’t have that chef-quality type of feel/taste to it. Instead, it felt like a vendor at a boardwalk had prepared it en-masse. Not that this makes it bad, but it automatically disqualifies it from a high-score since no personal touches were added to it. The worst part about the meal was the marinara sauce. I am glad that it was served with some, but this stuff just tasted like Spaghetti-O’s sauce. It was very nearly tomato paste. It was very bland and had an odd, sweet, flavor. It was also very flat and processed. There wasn’t too much to complain about since this calzone was only $5.95! The cheapest one yet! Despite the ridiculously awesome price (but also small size), I have to give this Calzone a D+ since it was just run-of-the-mill and was served with a pretty bad marinara sauce. Also, the restaurant needs to get rid of that smell. Woo Wee!